Back on the fiddle

I’ve never been one of those musicians who finds practising easy. It’s always been a bit like going to the gym — you enjoy having practised, or having done a 2km swim. Working up to practising (or exercising for that matter) you can almost see a little angel on one shoulder and a little devil on the other.

ANGEL: “You know you need to work on that passage in the E major. Just be a good little fiddler, take it slowly, break it down into bars, listen carefully…”

DEVIL: “Spicks and Specks is on TV. You owe it to yourself to put your feet up with that nice bar of berry chocolate…”

ANGEL: “You promised. A 2km swim and 40 mins a day”

DEVIL: “CHOCOLATE”

I broke my arm in ‘99, which obviously put paid to practising for a bit, and not long after got into childbearing mode, at which point the devil sat back with a smug smile and let sleep deprivation and toddlers do the work while the angel sobbed in the corner.

Ten years on, and I’m now trying to persuade little people to practise their respective instruments and wondering how my mother managed to do it and stay sane. Until the answer dawns on me. Forget trying to explain how to practise verbally. Get out your violin and show them. Show them how crap it sounds at first, and how soon it gets better, and what fun it is to play duets, and how satisfying it is to play perfectly in tune. Not instant gratification, granted, but the journey from can’t-even-smell-it to pretty-much-there is not insurmountable.

This realisation came, co-incidentally, within days of Charlotte Higgins blogging about playing chamber music. I read it with an uncanny sense of recognition. That was me – the nerdy girl on the train crashing into people with her schoolbag and violin, school orchestra, youth orchestra, orchestra camp, the Saturday morning rehearsals,  weekly lessons. I flirted with the idea of studying music, and even spent a year at Dartington College of Arts, practising three hours a day. It was intense. It was also not me. Like @chiggi, the student newspaper hooked me, and I found I was much better at writing about music than playing it. I still played at university – in fact,  I worked out that with orchestra, chamber orchestra, string quartets and pit band work it was an average of two a week while I was at university. But for me performing was always the least important part of playing music. Piecing together a new composition, or getting to know a great symphony from within an orchestra  or discovering Beethoven’s late quartets from the second violin part … it was enthralling.

Back to the future, and the fog is lifting. There are two cellists in the next street, and one of them is also a pianist, so there’s a potential trio. I’m a second violin by choice, so I’m still on the prowl for a fiddle player who likes the dazzly bits, and a viola player who tells good jokes. In the meantime, I’ve rehaired my bow, dug out the Sonatas and Partitas, and am having a fine old time. I’ve discovered that practising in the bathroom, while running the bath for small people, sounds marvellous to the practiser and delightfully muffled to anyone else and that, for the moment, suits me very well.

As time goes by I may start practising without the bath running, and even leave the bathroom altogether. Who knows, whether I’ll ever play late Beethoven again? (It might be better for all concerned if I didn’t). But the fiddler is back.

How to write a music review

Musica Viva Australia has come up with a fabby idea of running a competition to get audience members to submit reviews of their concerts. They’re running a pilot with this month’s Jerusalem Quartet concert. They’ve asked me to judge and also to give a few tips on writing reviews.

Besides centuries of scholarly debate about criticism, musical and otherwise, there are any number of ‘how-to-write’s out there in cyberspace. I’ve put some links things I find useful at the end of this. But, for what it is worth, here are my top ten tips for writing reviews.

DO

Listen to the music. Really listen. Anyone can let the music waft over them – indeed, it’s one of life’s great joys — but if you are going to write about a performance you need to practise active listening. It takes concentration but the great thing about active listening is that it is so rewarding, both for the audience, and for the performers. You can feel it when an audience is really, really listening, and it can be a terrifically exciting moment.

Listen to yourself. It’s amazing how many people say, “I couldn’t review: I don’t know anything about music.” And yet, these same people will go to a concert and talk with animation and great insight about how a performance made them feel. A review takes this reaction a step further by asking what it was about that particular performance that produced that particular feeling. It doesn’t have to be scientific; just articulate, considered and your own.

Tell a story A review is not a scorecard, nor yet a blow-by-blow account of what happened. Like any good story, a review will have a beginning, a middle and an end. It might mention every piece, but not necessarily. It will obviously mention the performers, but might also mention the venue, or what they played, or how they presented it, or even the audience. The trick is to use these elements to build a succinct and interesting account of your reaction to the concert.

Beware of adjectives This doesn’t just apply to reviews! Adjectives can be a writer’s best friend, but they can turn into their worst enemy. Piling on the purple prose might make you feel like you are getting closer to the heart of the music, but it slows down the story. There are many ways to describe – through verbs, similes, or even the rhythm of the prose.

Be accurate. If this is too obvious, I apologize, but nothing is more dispiriting to a performer, and nothing more delightful to a picky reader, than spotting a factual error in a review. Check the program (if there is one, and if there is it usually online too), check the spelling of the artists’ names, call the presenter, phone a friend, but don’t publish something – and posting online counts as publishing — if you’re not 100% sure of your facts.

DON’T

Be mean. Writing a review puts you in an unusual position – you are passing judgement on a performance you could almost certainly not do yourself. It is not about pulling your punches, but do always respect the skill of the artists and the long journey they have taken to get where they are. Most importantly, if their performance disappoints, try to analyse why. It might not necessarily be wrong notes. What was missing?

Be obscure For the purposes of this exercise, let us assume you are writing for a general audience. Your readers may have been at the concert but it is much more likely they were not. They may follow classical music avidly, or just be interested in a good gig. No need to dumb down, but a discussion of the finer points of Sonata Form or middle eight chord progressions is for a program note or musicological essay, not a review.

Be trivial ‘Write about the band, not missing your train home,’ says Alex Petridis of The Guardian. He’s spot on. Your evening might be coloured by the terrible traffic on the bridge, but that’s the kind of detail which sits best in a personal diary or facebook page. We want to know about the performance.

Worry. Don’t worry about your musical knowledge or lack thereof. Don’t feel you need research your subject to the n-th degree. If you were there, you listened and you had a reaction, you have the basic ingredients for a review. Now tell the story!

Be late I’m not talking about being late for the concert, although struggling to get your breath back through the first movement or, worse, having to wait outside the door is never fun. I am referring to your deadline. A music critic can be insightful as they like, but if they do not deliver their story on time (and to the correct length), it won’t get published. The Herald usually needs the story by midday after the night of the gig. Musica Viva’s So-You-Think-You-Can-Write brief is up to 350 words, 48 hours from the start time of the concert. Whatever the deadline, don’t leave it too long. There’s nothing so old as old news.

Further reading:

Every would-be writer – in fact, every writer full stop — should read George Orwell’s rules on writing good English at least once a year.

1.     Never use a metaphor, simile or other figure of speech which you are used to seeing in print.

2.     Never use a long word where a short one will do.

3.     If it is possible to cut a word out, always cut it out.

4.     Never use the passive where you can use the active.

5.     Never use a foreign phrase, a scientific word or a jargon word if you can think of an everyday English equivalent.

6.     Break any of these rules sooner than say anything barbarous.

From ‘On Politics and Language’ by George Orwell, in its entirety here.

Closer to home, Yvonne Frindley, who writes about music for Sydney Symphony and many others, has much sound advice and reflection on good writing about music in her blog, Thomasina’s Last Waltz. Start here.

Finally, there’s nothing like reading good writing. You will have your own favourites, but Alex Ross (author of The Rest is Noise and critic of the New Yorker) lists many music critics in the US. Seek inspiration here.

Dear publicist / arts marketing department

Thank you for your very informative media kit. I know you spent a long time preparing it. However, I already feel bad about the number of trees that are sacrificed in the name of print media. I don’t want to feel bad about your media kit as well. Therefore:

1. Please feel free to email me a .pdf of the media kit. I like an electronic kit because I can do a text search, and it doesn’t clog up my mail box or my recycling bin or give my postie a hernia. If I want to read it cover to cover I will print it out myself.

2. If you do feel a pressing need to send me a hard copy please feel free to print on both sides of the paper.  I’d also feel much less guilty if you used recycled paper.

3.  If your organisation is printing brochures, can I still have one of those please? I use them as a year round reference.

If you are already doing this – and thumbs up to Opera Queensland and tjc who are amongst those who are – many thanks.

Piano Wars post script

Given that it’s now six years on, it seems only fair to finish the story. In 2004, contrary to my woefully tentative prediction, Kawai won the 2004 Sydney International Piano Competition. The driver was John Chen, a New Zealander. He is alive and well and active as a soloist, particularly in Australasia. He is still on the competition circuit, but as a member of the Saguaro Piano Trio.

Steinway won back the title in 2008, with their hell-for-leather driver, Konstantin Shamray, who kept the pit crew very busy retuning and stringing. The people’s prize (and my vote) went to Ran Dank, but I can’t find any reference to what piano he played.

Piano wars

Anne Midgette’s great piece, http://voices.washingtonpost.com/the-classical-beat/2009/10/steinway_rolls_in.html inspired me to revisit this Sydney stoush…

The Seventh Sydney International Piano Competition, July 2000. The atmosphere in the Olympic city was electric. From a field of 36 competitors, there were just six finalists about to face the grand play off in front of a live audience of 2500 and a further 1.6 million listeners tuning into ABC Classic FM’s live broadcast.

Who would it be? The dazzling young performer from Japan; the powerful and commanding Ukrainian; or the retiring Russian girl, in whose delicate hands Mozart floated like perfection through the Concert Hall of the Sydney Opera House?

With all votes in, the hall fell silent as the chair of the jury made the long-awaited announcement. The winner of the 2000 Sydney International Piano Competition… Steinway!

The full story…

About Crabbe

There’s been a bit of taking sides about Neil Armfield’s inclusion of a prominent non-speaking, all-seeing role for a gentleman named Dr Crabbe. For what it’s worth, here’s where I stand.

First, it was a beautiful performance. Again, like the set, it was always going to be risky, and in the wrong hands it could be intrusive and embarrassing, even arrogant. Thankfully, it was in the right hands. It is hard to imagine another actor who could have played this role with such delicacy and gravitas. Peter Carroll rocks.

Second and, again, like the set, Armfield’s Crabbe conceit was, for me, another part of the seamlessness of the how this story leapt from page to stage to the inside of my head. To say I didn’t notice Crabbe is obviously wrong. But he was such a plausible member of the community, such an intrinsic part of the drama, that he didn’t cause me a moment’s pause.

Third, and perhaps most important, the introduction of a character who is not explicitly described in the composer’s score or directions is a natural and entirely appropriate gesture for a work which has ceased to be the sole domain of its creator. Pretty much everyone recognises Peter Grimes as a work which has earned an enduring posi in the repertoire. Which means it is out there, in the world, still related to Britten (and Pears, and Crabbe, and Montagu Slater) but making its own way. It is an exciting place to be. Persnally speaking, I’m not yet ready for a Peter Grimes set on Mars but, hey, if it makes good theatre…

(As a side comment, the alternative is to be one of those execrable set-in-stone shows like Phantom or Les Mis. Or rather, preserved in aspic, because they can still move, physically and emotionally, but in a rather wobbly and disturbing way.)

Peter Grimes continued…

For many directors the set would have been a gamble. Even Armfield says that it is a reference to the magic of the final rehearsals, an admission which lays it open to accusations of po-mo, referential, meta-this, meta-that in-house stage-y-ness. Which I LOVE, as many do, but it’s kind of cheating. But the set here took me back, with fierce clarity, to a village hall in South England (where I was brought up), and to all those curious relationships you have with neighbours and family and the-lady-who-works-at-the-post-office and the-man-with-the-hat-on-the-139. I spent the first act being fascinated by the people — the methodist, so beautifully observed, and Mrs Sedley, a curtain twitcher if ever I saw one.

Against this fascinating foreground there was, in the background, a story playing out. It felt almost like a Breughel painting — Icarus making a minor splash in the corner of the painting. OK, Peter Grimes did play out his story in a slightly more centre stage manner but, as Britten and Pears and Crabbe and Armfield and everyone on stage demonstrates at the end of the piece, life goes on, with astonishing consistency.

This isn’t a review and this blog isn’t going to be about reviewing. It’s more a thoughtwhirl. For what it is worth, Peter Grimes is terrific. If you’re in Sydney in October 2009 you should see it, and if you’re not, you should go to Perth. But if you miss it, well, life goes on.

Going to the opera

Last night I went to the opera.

It was definitely the opera. I was in the Sydney Opera House and there were people in frocks and stuff and an orchestra in a dark, dark hole. But, I swear, when the action started, in all its media res brilliance, I totally forgot it was an opera. I totally missed the clues —  everyone singing all the time, for example — because I was so utterly hooked by the drama.

It was a court scene, a post-mortem. Pretty much the whole town had turned out to see what the coroner had to say. And when he said “Accidental death”  it rippled across the entire hall like a shockwave. Not a melodramatic shockwave, but a twitchy, snitchy one. Eyebrows raised, lips pursed and all that.

It was about then that I remembered where I was, namely at the first night of Opera Australia’s new production of Benjamin Britten’s opera, Peter Grimes. Normally by now, about ten minutes into the performance, I would have been relaxing into the music, checking out the scenic design, letting my mind wander around the magical toyshop of music and words and all there is to see in an opera. But something about the acting, the singing and the setting of this opening scene bypassed all the superficial critical faculties and went straight to the story-craving heart of my brain. It was alive, they were real, and the fact that they were singing rather than talking was entirely unnoteworthy.

All that as a prequel to saying this is a great show. You’d want it to be, with such a cast and such a creative team. I’m not up for a role by role assessment because, vague as it sounds, they were all brilliant. I’m far more interested in the way sounds and words and pictures and stories and emotions and philosophies all combine together. It doesn’t have to be via opera. In 2009 opera no longer has naming rights to ‘multimedia’. But this production is certainly a fine example of what opera can do at its best, namely telling a story which takes on a life of its own.